The Murder of Roger Ackroyd

Agatha Christie

Illustrated by Andrew Davidson

Introduced by Sophie Hannah

Hercule Poirot gets to the bottom of an especially unnerving case in this irresistible illustrated Folio edition of one of Agatha Christie’s most celebrated mysteries, The Murder of Roger Ackroyd.

£49.95
£49.95
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‘Agatha Christie had a mind like a mousetrap and taught me, in novels like The Murder of Roger Ackroyd, the pleasure of literary surprise’

  1. William Dietrich

Proclaimed by the Crime Writers’ Association as ‘the finest example of the genre ever penned’, The Murder of Roger Ackroyd contains one of the most celebrated twists in crime fiction and is consistently voted among Agatha Christie’s best novels. It is, famously, the Poirot novel that demands to be read twice: the curious reader cannot resist re-examining what they thought they knew. Laura Thompson, Christie’s biographer, described it as ‘masterly: deceptive in every way’, and it remains a rare treat for those who savour the challenge of a whodunnit, yet love to be taken in by a master of her craft.

Production Details

Bound in blocked buckram

Set in in Monotype Bell with Kabel Heavy as display

240 pages

Frontispiece and 6 colour illustrations

Plain slipcase

9˝ x 5¾˝

Deadly secrets at every turn

Fatigued by a career filled with extraordinary cases, Hercule Poirot retires to the sleepy village of King’s Abbot, hoping to apply his ‘little grey cells’ to the cultivation of a thriving vegetable garden. But when the local squire is found with a dagger sticking out of his neck, the detective once again finds himself at the heart of a perplexing mystery. Far from sleepy, it seems that King’s Abbot is home to blackmail, illicit love affairs, drug abuse and more, and Poirot’s investigations will lead him to his most startling conclusions yet. 

An unmissable Poirot mystery

Andrew Davidson’s sensitive illustrations capture the period, the humour and the underlying tension of Christie’s iconic mystery, making this an irresistible edition of one of the most influential books in the crime fiction canon. Sophie Hannah, herself an acclaimed novelist, has been entrusted by the Christie estate to continue Poirot’s adventures, and she has provided a fond and perceptive introduction, exclusive to this edition. In it, she examines this ‘extra-special’ book and Christie’s dedication to pushing the boundaries and conventions of the crime novel to their very limits. Produced in series with Murder on the Orient Express, The Murder of Roger Ackroyd is an essential volume in Folio’s Agatha Christie collection.

‘Makes breathless reading from first to the unexpected last’

  1. The Observer

Origins befitting a crime novel

The Murder of Roger Ackroyd was published in June 1926, six months before Agatha Christie famously vanished for eleven days, eventually turning up in a hotel in Yorkshire apparently suffering from amnesia. The book was likely written at a time of great emotional turmoil for Christie – her marriage was ending and her beloved mother was dying – yet it is an extraordinarily precise piece of work, ingeniously crafted around its infamous central twist and expertly calculated to deceive. All the usual delights of a Christie novel are in ample evidence here, from intriguing clues and complex relationships to the charming figure of Poirot himself – ever witty, sharp and ultimately compassionate. The Murder of Roger Ackroyd also features Caroline, the narrator’s delightfully gossipy and observant sister, who Christie later revealed was a forerunner for her other great sleuth, the unforgettable Miss Marple.

About Agatha Christie

Agatha Christie was born in Torquay in 1890 and is the author of over 80 works, including detective novels and short stories, 19 plays, and six novels published under the pseudonym Mary Westmacott. Her first novel, The Mysterious Affair at Styles, was published in 1920 and introduced the world to Hercule Poirot, who would become one of the most popular fictional detectives since Sherlock Holmes (as would another of Christie’s sleuths, the amateur detective Miss Marple). In 1952 her play The Mousetrap premiered in London’s West End and has run continuously ever since. Christie’s books have sold more than two billion copies in over 100 languages (said to be outsold only by the Bible and Shakespeare), and have been adapted many times for film and television. She was made a dame in 1971, and died in Oxfordshire in 1976. In 2013, she was voted the greatest crime writer of all time by the Crime Writers’ Association.

About Sophie Hannah

Sophie Hannah is an internationally bestselling writer of psychological crime fiction, published in 49 languages and 51 territories. In 2014, with the blessing of Agatha Christie’s family and estate, Hannah published a new Poirot novel, The Monogram Murders, which was a bestseller in more than 15 countries. She has since published two more Poirot novels, Closed Casket and The Mystery of Three Quarters, both of which were Sunday Times Top Ten bestsellers. In 2013, Hannah’s novel The Carrier won the Crime Thriller of the Year Award at the Specsavers National Book Awards. She has also published a self-help book, How to Hold a Grudge, two short story collections and five collections of poetry, the fifth of which, Pessimism for Beginners, was shortlisted for the T. S. Eliot Award. Her poetry is studied at GCSE, A Level and degree level across the UK.

About Andrew Davidson

Andrew Davidson studied graphic design at Norwich School of Art and then at the Royal College of Art. He is known for his use of traditional engraving and printing methods. Davidson also paints traditionally, using gouache, and prints block-colour illustrations with wood blocks. He works with French or Japanese paper, engraving on English boxwood and printing the blocks on an 1859 Albion hand press. He has worked with publishers including HarperCollins, Transworld, Faber and Faber, Random House, Penguin Books and Oxford University Press, and also with Shell, BP, Rolex, the All England Lawn Tennis Association, Amtrak, Railtrack, Cunard, Mitchell and Butler, Shepherd Neame, Highland Distillers and the National Museums of Scotland.

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